


Undiscovered

by AvocadoLove



Series: The Unbreakable Bond [6]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alpha/Beta, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Amnesia, M/M, Mating Bond, Mind Control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2016-12-31
Packaged: 2018-09-13 13:54:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9126697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvocadoLove/pseuds/AvocadoLove
Summary: Tony searches for his missing Alpha, but fate has other plans...





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for all the awesome comments on the last fic. I had a late work day, and will get to replying to all of them tomorrow. Meanwhile, enjoy this next fic in the series. :)

Tony smelled a rat. And that rat lived in the walls of his own house.

He leaned back in his chair, fingers tapping on the glass worktable in front of him. He liked to imagine he was building tension, letting his creation sit and stew in his own guilt the way Howard used to make Tony when he had fucked up something in the workshop.

_That_ uncomfortable comparison was enough to make Tony break his silence. “JARVIS, what have you been hiding from me?”

“I am unclear what you mean, sir.”

“This is not all of the data you have collected on James, is it?” He gestured to the spare data points he’d managed to compile. The few mapped locations he’d been spotted out of the tower over the last few years, the voice and facial recognition software he had running for the past few weeks which had turned up nothing over the past few weeks. Since James had shut the connection completely.

Again, there was that brief, hesitant pause. As if his AI were thinking. “I have followed all proper protocols.”

“Protocols?!” Tony’s fist slammed on the table as he stood. “I am the administrator, here. Are you going HAL on me? Are your systems exploited? Why are you keeping intel from me, J?”

“The existing privacy protocol overwrites your command, sir.”

That made Tony pause. He had built in very serious, bulletproof privacy features directly into JARVIS’s mainframe. This was done for legal as well as ethical reasons, though he never expected it to be turned back on him. “And who asked specifically for this level of privacy?” he asked, though he knew the answer.

“James did, of course.”

Tony rubbed the bridge of his nose. James made a habit of drifting in and out of Stark tower — now Avengers tower. Tony never kept track of all his movements because he had trusted the Alpha.

At some point, James must have discovered JARVIS’s privacy settings. Then, asked specifically to keep details of his life private from Tony’s access. JARVIS would still collect relevant information, but the cashe would be destroyed every night at midnight during daily data purges.

It was still possible to recover that data, but Tony would have to rip JARVIIS down to nuts and bolts — _figuratively_ — to do it.

A small, desperate part of him, an _Omega_ part that Tony him waking at night in a cold sweat, reaching out for mentally for the bond that was not there, wondered if it would be worth it. He _hated_ that part of himself. Jarvis was his creation, as close to a child as Tony would ever get.

Even if this did feel like JARVIS had turned on him.

How _could_ he withhold this information? Didn’t he see that it was important?

“Sir—“

He didn’t have time for this. “Mute,” Tony snapped, angry and bitter and frustrated and shockingly close to tears again. It seemed he was always on the brink, nowadays.

Not to be stymied, the screens around Tony’s workstation flashed with a familiar warning: Tony’s temperature was rising, indicating a pre-heat.

His heart contracted. It wasn’t uncommon for Omegas to fall into heat after the loss of their Alpha. It was nature’s way of ensuring the Omega’s fertility… but James wasn’t dead, was he? Or had Tony only been fooling himself? Maybe the bond wasn’t ‘shut’ at all. Maybe…

The lights around his workshop flashed red in warning a moment before the klaxon went on. This was a totally different kind of warning: The Avengers needed to assemble.

Part of him was grateful for the distraction. He could function well enough in pre-heat, and if he was blowing things up, he wouldn’t have to think about what it meant…

Tony aimed a look at the ceiling, where the closest of JARVIS’ cameras was installed. “Pre-heat or not, this isn’t over, Mister. You and I,” he said, pointing up to the ceiling, “are going to have a very serious sit-down conversation after this is all done.”

 

****

 

Tony had been co-leading the Avengers since the Battle of Manhattan, and had been a warmonger since the age of nineteen. Not a lot surprised him.

Nick Fury sending a distress call from his smart SUV? Now, that was enough for Tony to sit up and take notice.

By the time Tony rocketed into DC airspace, Steve hanging onto his side and what the media like to call the ‘hug and fly’ the roadway was a disaster.

Men in police cruisers surrounded Fury’s black SUV. From the way they were trying to punch-in using automatic machine guns, Tony guessed that those cop uniforms were just for show.

Steve pointed directly downward, toward a relatively clear patch in the fray. Tony could feel him reaching back for his shield. “Land me there. I’ll go low and take out — who in the world is that?”

Tony’s HUD targeted in on a lone figure walking deliberately toward Fury’s crippled SUV. He was clad from head to foot in black tactical gear, as well as a black muzzle across his face. The tight clothing outlined every inch of the man that Tony knew so well, even from a distance.

And, of course there was the matter of the metal arm.

“Shit,” Tony said. Then, as the man—as _James_ – stopped and took aim at Fury’s SUV with a bazooka gun, he repeated it. “Shit.”

He was alive. James was _alive_.

Tony had frozen mid-air air with a shock. Steve didn’t have the same problem. Standing on one of Tony’s jetboots for balance, he let the shield fly. It struck just as James fired, sending the shot wide and into the corner of a cement building.

Steve was barking orders at him, telling Tony to lower him down, obviously not knowing why he had stopped. From under the SUV, Tony’s HUD showed a bright infrared flash has Fury used a torch to cut himself out. Using the distraction to escape.

Tony hardly paid attention. It was as if a buzzing had filled his head. Shock and horror.

James had turned to look to see where the shield had come from. There was no recognition in his steel-gray eyes when he looked at Tony. The bond was as closed as ever.

He and Steve were only the first two Avengers on the scene. Thank goodness Thor was out of the country. But Clint and Natasha were heading in on quinjet. Steve was radioing them in, apparently having given up on Tony. And James was raising his gun.…

Tony dropped Steve, unceremoniously, trusting super soldier reactions to let Steve land on his feet.

Then Tony landed right in front of James, putting himself between Steve and his Alpha. He opened the helmet. “What is this, a way to get my attention? Well, you officially have it. Where have you been?”

Something flickered in James’s eyes, though it wasn’t recognition. It was confusion. His gun was still raised, but didn’t fire. Taking this is a good sign, Tony went on.

“What’s with the new look? A little BDSM for my taste, though I can roll with it. But trying to kill my sort-of boss? Not cool. James, put the gun down.”

“Tony, what are you doing?” Steve yelled, fear and frustration in his voice. James’s dangerous gaze focused on him.

Tony stepped forward, one hand touching James’s flesh wrist. “Whatever this is, whatever’s happened, we can work it out.”

Bad move. In a second, the metal hand had clamped around Tony’s throat. Behind them, Steve yelled and let the shield fly. James ducked it, shoving Tony to the ground in the same move. Tony choked, clawing at the metal fingers, but the grip was stronger even than his gauntlets. He could activate the chest uni-beam and blast James away… No. Out of the question.

“James,” he gasped with the last of his air. “You’re hurting me.”

Maybe it was his imagination, but this time something real and true flickered in James’s eyes. The metal fingers loosened from his throat.

A crack formed in the wall of the closed-off bond. The horror that washed through Tony didn’t feel like his own.

A second later, and enraged Captain America barreled into James, throwing the other Alpha to the side.

The bond snapped shut as whatever emptiness was in James’s head took hold again.

Tony tried to stagger to his feet, but something was wrong. Either he couldn’t get enough air, or, more likely, bond-shock was taking hold of him again. He fell to his knees as the world went fuzzy and tunneled around the edges.

From what felt like far away he thought he heard Steve’s amazed, shocked voice.

“Bucky?”

Everything went black.


End file.
